


Rosie's First Word

by wendymarlowe



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Fluff, M/M, Parent!lock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-10
Updated: 2017-06-10
Packaged: 2018-11-12 14:40:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11163984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wendymarlowe/pseuds/wendymarlowe
Summary: It's Rosie's first birthday, but she's not the only one getting presents. (A fluffy domestic parent!lock ficlet)





	Rosie's First Word

“Rosie-dear, I hear someone’s having a birthday! How are you two--oh.” 

Sherlock and Rosie both scrambled to their feet as John entered the flat. Rosie still clung precariously to Sherlock’s trouser leg, but she looked up at Sherlock as if to say “See? I can do it too!”

“Not so much with the tidying, then.” John hadn't actually _expected_ Sherlock to do it, but he'd hoped. “Sherlock, we agreed. I gave you the choice, but you wanted _me_ to go to Tesco and _you_ were going to clean up the flat a bit before Rosie’s party.” He carried the two large bags of party snacks into the kitchen and set them down on the only partially clean table. Looking around, he could see Sherlock had shuffled a few papers into piles, but the flat was its usual cluttered mess from Rosie’s height up.

“You didn’t say tidy,” Sherlock countered, still standing stiffly in the middle of the sitting room floor. “You said to prepare for the party, and that’s what we were doing.”

It was true he'd put on the suit John liked best, the one with the pressed black trousers and the pale blue shirt whose collar perfectly framed his suprasternal notch. And Rosie was in one of the frilly pink dresses Mrs. Hudson had bought for her which Sherlock usually avoided dealing with. Still, though… “If ‘Rosie didn’t help me’ is going to be your excuse for why you didn’t clean, Sherlock, I’m not buying it.”

Sherlock groaned. _“Boring._ Watch. Here, Rosie, would you like my handkerchief?” He pulled it out of a pocket and offered it to her.

Rosie let go of his leg to grab for it with both chubby hands. Her balance was still not the greatest, but she managed to tug it out of his grip without falling. “Ta,” she said clearly, before stuffing the corner in her mouth.

Sherlock beamed.

“Was that--”

She extracted the slightly soggy cloth and offered it back to Sherlock. “Peez!”

“She’s not quite got the hang of returning objects yet, but she’s gotten very good at thank you when receiving. Here, Rosie, I don’t need this back. Go give it to your daddy.”

“Ta!”, she exclaimed, and speed-crawled to John. “Peez?”

John sat down in the nearest chair so he could haul her up into his lap. “You taught her please and thank you?” Rosie had been saying “Da” and “no” for a few weeks, but so far she’d been stubbornly refusing to try anything else.

Rosie wiped the soggy handkerchief on John’s shirt. “Ta.”

Sherlock actually looked a bit sheepish. “I did tidy a bit, but you… you seem to place a high priority on social niceties like ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ and ‘I’m sorry.’ Rosie will presumably be receiving gifts this afternoon. Therefore, she and I have been working on ‘please’ and ‘ta.’” He paused. “The… it was sort of a present for you,” he added softly.

 _This man._ This insufferable, amazing, tremendous man. John squeezed Rosie tighter and resolved to ignore the telltale prickling of impending tears. “Come here,” he told most wonderful man in his life, and stood to meet him halfway. “Rosie and I have a sort-of present for you too. Rosie-girl, what do we say when Sherlock does something particularly clever?”

Rosie held up her arms, imploring Sherlock to hold her. John handed her over so Rosie could sit on Sherlock’s hip.

“B’ent,” she declared.

 _Close_. “Errr. That’s supposed to be ‘brilliant,’ by the way.” He hadn’t needed to clarify, though--Sherlock was looking back and forth between him and Rosie with a heartbreakingly stunned expression.

“You taught her that… for me?” he asked in a whisper. “Truly? Even though…”

“She’s every bit your daughter as she is mine,” John murmured, stepping closer. “You spend just as much time with her as I do, and I know you love her. So, so much. Rosie, you hear that? Daddy Sherlock and I both love you more than the whole world.”

Sherlock made a choked noise at “Daddy Sherlock.” Without warning, he wrapped his free arm around John and pulled the three of them into a tight hug. “I never thought I’d be a father,” he gasped, his voice thick. “I assumed I… but then I had you, and I wanted to keep you with me forever.”

“I’m sorry you couldn't.” It was an inadequate answer for the grieving, the temper, the wedding, Mary, all of it, but John meant something that couldn’t be conveyed in mere words and he knew Sherlock understood. “I wish we could have too--if it hadn’t been for you going off to protect me from Moriarty, I’d never have left.”

“But you came back.” Sherlock rested his cheek on John’s forehead and sighed. “You and Rosie.”

“ _Our_ Rosie.”

“God, yes.”

Rosie tolerated the hug with her two fathers for a while, but fifteen seconds of silent emotions must have been enough. With a sharp _bop_ to Sherlock’s ear, she torqued her little body away in a clear request to be put down.

“B’ent,” she declared, waving her damp fist in Sherlock's face. John received an equally serious look. “Da peez.”

John raised an eyebrow. “Am I called ‘Daddy Please’ now?”

Rosie heaved a giant sigh and leaned as far as she could toward the kitchen. “B’ent, Da peez, TEA!”


End file.
